Cessy lowered herself beside the fault opening Lucan surveyed, stopping where the solar mark began to heat her wrapped palm.
"This is as far as I got," he muttered, wedging his viewing lens against a stone that overlooked the plaza.
"The crack runs behind the ward, but cross its lower lip and the thing starts tasting Underworld mana."
She took the lens without a word, clamping her core down before it could leak another measure toward the opening. Below, the Dread King smashed a doorway above the humans, driving their front line into the road beneath falling stone.
"Eight ranks stopped holding him the moment we pulled out," she said, twisting the lens to cut through the dust.
"That's why we left the inner fittings behind instead of trying another correction."
"And that's why I hate watching you reach for another needle," he shot back, catching the motion beneath her sleeve.
She slid one marrow needle free and held it against her wrist, just above the opening.
